Dorico - An Ongoing Journey

[foorere]

I am now using Dorico Pro 2. Still really liking it. I do find that I spend a little more time inserting music than in Finale, but when I'm getting music ready to print, its 100x faster to get parts ready. And I never have to deal with the ridiculous amount of Finale bugs. This is especially important as I'm oftentimes writing for large ensembles and I used to dread editing parts in Finale.

Is there any reference score/part we can see? Just the most complex you do in Dorico, a page or two.

Doritos [SIC] won't be anywhere near as well implemented as Finale. There are probably samples on their website. If F25 still had a movie window I'd use it. I'm on F2014.5 forever or bust.

I was referring to the person who uses it, Elektroakoustika. I see I haven't been so clear in my post.

[leigh]

Dorico 2.2 is out: https://blog.dorico.com/2018/11/dorico- ... much-more/

EDIT: Scoring Notes review: https://www.scoringnotes.com/reviews/dorico-2-2/. This might be better on phones. Thanks, Mark.

**Leigh

[mhschmieder]

I came to post about the update to Dorico, but someone beat me to it. Even so, this KVR article might be easier for people to read if they're on a small device, as the one linked above has gigantic images and also requires lots of scrolling to follow. But it's also probably more complete.

https://www.kvraudio.com/news/steinberg ... jazz-43483

I haven't read either link in detail yet, as that will have to wait for the work day to end. I was simply disappointed that Steinberg did not include Dorico in their Black Friday or Cyber Monday sale.

[MIDI Life Crisis]

I scanned the link and it would seem that playing via sequencer is the biggest add on. Finale does that as well, so not a deal creator for me just yet. I'm still liming along on F2014.5 and will until the cows come home.

I am encouraged that Steinberg sees a market for a pro level notation app. I only wish MOTU did, but at this point I'd be happy to see Apple2000 get booted permanently. Morons!

[mhschmieder]

There are rumours that Dorico will go on sale soon, once the 20th anniversary sale on Cubase (including upgrade and crossgrades) ends.

If the price is right, I'm in, even though some of those Tips pages that Mike posted, show that Dorico fonts and symbols are not yet as sharp as Sibelius or Finale.

[MIDI Life Crisis]

There are rumours that Dorico will go on sale soon, once the 20th anniversary sale on Cubase (including upgrade and crossgrades) ends.

If the price is right, I'm in, even though some of those Tips pages that Mike posted, show that Dorico fonts and symbols are not yet as sharp as Sibelius or Finale.

Wait... we can't load whatever fonts we want? It would seem that would be a very basic thing, especially in a notation program. No?

[mhschmieder]

Oh, I don't know if Dorico supports the loading of fonts. I was just basing my evaluation off of side-by-side comparisons of the three main notation apps at that Tips site you pointed us to (and thanks for that).

[mikehalloran]

Here's the Dorico forum.
https://www.steinberg.net/forums/viewforum.php?f=246

Lots of threads but they're pretty easy to search. Here's one about symbols and fonts:

https://www.steinberg.net/forums/viewto ... ts#p841538

Daniel at Steinberg is Daniel Spreadbury, the chief cook and bottlewasher for Dorico. SMuFL is his baby.


There is talk of Dorico 3 coming out soon. No release date has been mentioned, of course. If a sale is announced and doesn't mention 3, I'd be looking to see if a crossgrade includes it when available.

Scoring Notes will probably announce a day or two early with details. If not subscribed (free), I recommend it. Here's a recent article on the look of Dorico vis a vis Finale and Sibelius. Well worth the time, IMO.
https://www.scoringnotes.com/tips/space ... -notation/

[mhschmieder]

Yep, that's the article I was referring to, and Sibelius looks the best to me, unfortunately (as I never had much luck with it on macOS).

Interesting discussion at the Dorico forum though on the custom fonts possibilities.

[artfarm1]

I've been guilty of being a 'fanboy' for Sibelius, then Finale, then Sibelius, then Finale.....ad nauseum, etc. Have used Sibelius since ver. 2, and Finale off and on for various projects of my bands since 2010.

But, I've managed to accomplish my scores and parts, while managing to thoroughly confuse myself along the way by my having to keep track of various scores, parts, renditions, changes, etc. etc.

Well...I crossgraded to Dorico 2 about 2 weeks ago, and I'm sticking with it. I've been able to accomplish what I need to do extremely easily, and I'm barely scratching the surface of everything it can do at this early stage of it's growth.

I've been importing lots of MXL files, while rearranging charts and parts to learn Dorico. Loving it!

If anyone's on the fence about getting Dorico, just dive in. The water's fine!
And getting warmer!

It's nice to pose a support question and get an answer from Daniel Spreadbury himself as well....bonus!

The whole Sibelius licencing/transferring thing is such a time-waster. I've been trying to get Sibelius licensed on my studio computer....just had to say screw it....that helped me move on Dorico right away.

I don't mind having to use a dongle for Steinberg products. At least it works!

Once you wrap your mind around the Dorico keystrokes/commands, things are really fast and consistent. And I'm using Keystroke Maestro without problem for programming my external numeric keypad.

All is well.

[labman]

Well...I crossgraded to Dorico 2 about 2 weeks ago, and I'm sticking with it. I've been able to accomplish what I need to do extremely easily, and I'm barely scratching the surface of everything it can do at this early stage of it's growth.

I've been importing lots of MXL files, while rearranging charts and parts to learn Dorico. Loving it!

If anyone's on the fence about getting Dorico, just dive in. The water's fine!
And getting warmer!

Thank you for this post artfarm. Needed to hear that.

[mikehalloran]

I made the crossgrade awhile back when it was on sale. A few impressions:

I don’t use the dongle and went with the e-licenser which allows only one device. A major PIA involving Tech Support and emailed files but they were quick to respond. Once you get through it, stays in the background and doesn’t give me grief. Transferring it to my new iMac wasn’t painless nor was it intuitive but I figured it without assistance. Daniel says that they’re working on getting away from the e-licenser but that won’t happen by v.3 due in 2019. Minor annoyance for me but there are many threads on the Dorico forum indicating displeasure.

Note entry one-handed is not that quick in most notation apps but certainly doable in Finale, Overture, Encore and Notion. Not so easy in Dorico. At this point, I’m not a fan.

I’m glad to see that someone likes the MusicXML capabilities. This is a sore point among many users. Daniel admits that there’s a lot of work to be done but hasn’t promised that we’ll see it in 3.

I like the overall look and much about Dorico. I don’t have a problem using something else to do most of the heavy lifting in, say Finale and engrave in Dorico. It’s just not ready to meet my needs — yet. 3, perhaps?

Speaking of which, Dorico 3 for the Mac will not work on El Capitán. Sierra or later will be required.

[artfarm1]

Importing MXL files is by no means perfect and foolproof. There is still some cleaning up to do once in Dorico. (...but, that goes for any MXL files going to and from any notation program or DAW in either direction, right? It's not a perfect science as far as I can tell.)

But the ease of clean-up and the ease of re-arranging, deleting undesirable MXL 'interpretations' from some imported scores, etc. is helping me learn my way around Dorico.

And then, I have a new and improved score compared to what I previously had accomplished in Sibelius.

Then...understanding how to create a 'clean', new score in Dorico is a breeze after going through the pains of re-working a bunch of old MXL score imports. (...much easier than having initially learned how to use Finale!)

PS...NotePerformer 3 is working fine for me in Dorico in order to check notes and hear rendition of my music. I haven't even delved into all the other 'DAW-like' options of Dorico.

[mikehalloran]

I haven’t really gotten into Note Performer yet but I grabbed it when it was $50 off a few weeks ago.

Normally, I drop an .xml file into Notion 6 ($79 crossgrade from anything) when I want a quick listen—very good for that task. I’m looking to see what Note Performer can do.

[artfarm1]

Something I want to try in Dorico with NotePerformer (even though I'm primarily focused on scores/parts for printout)...

....because you can mix 'stems' of different instrument tracks in the Dorico mixer upon output.

I heard a music file by someone who played back his score with NotePerformer, and then used some extra plugins, EQ, etc. to beef up the various instrumental stems in the mix.

Wow...it was pretty nice indeed. A lot of various instruments are well represented and reproduced in NotePerformer.

(...but trailer-music-epic-sound-library-type composers don't have to lose any sleep....yet!)